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Russell Berman

Russell Berman is a senior associate editor at The Atlantic, where he covers political news. He was previously a congressional reporter for The Hill and a Washington correspondent for The New York Sun.

September 11, 2017
The government’s biggest challenge in responding to Hurricane Irma may not be its strength as much as its size. Federal, state, and local officials had been preparing for more than a week before the storm made landfall as a Category 4 hurricane over the Florida Keys on Sunday morning and...

September 10, 2017
The government’s biggest challenge in responding to Hurricane Irma may not be its strength as much as its size. Federal, state, and local officials had been preparing for more than a week before the storm made landfall as a Category 4 hurricane over the Florida Keys on Sunday morning and...

September 8, 2017
When Republicans took control of the House of Representatives in January 2011 after sweeping then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi out of the majority, one of the first things they did was to take a hostage. The nation’s statutory debt limit, they decided, would no longer automatically be increased when Congress passed a...

September 5, 2017
Republicans have spent most of 2017 fighting among themselves. Conservatives have jousted with moderates. Both factions have tangled with party leaders. And President Trump has bickered with just about all of them. September was shaping up to be the nastiest brawl of all. With the end of the fiscal year...

August 29, 2017
The flood waters in Houston have yet to recede, and it might take days or weeks to assess the full damage wrought by Hurricane Harvey. But Texas lawmakers are already sure of one thing: They’re going to need more money from Congress. Calls for the House and Senate to approve...

August 24, 2017
Republican leaders don’t want a government shutdown. Democrats don’t either, at least not officially. And yet come this fall, or perhaps just in time for Christmas, federal agencies might once again send their nonessential employees home and national parks and museums might close their doors—all because of President Trump’s insistence...

August 8, 2017
The U.S. military hasn’t added a new uniformed service in 70 years, when the Air Force was created in the aftermath of World War II. If Congress gets its way, that will soon change. In a bipartisan vote last month, the House of Representatives approved legislation that would direct the...

August 8, 2017
The U.S. military hasn’t added a new uniformed service in 70 years, when the Air Force was created in the aftermath of World War II. If Congress gets its way, that will soon change. In a bipartisan vote last month, the House of Representatives approved legislation that would direct the...

August 4, 2017
And just like that, Donald Trump finally has the semblance of a presidential administration. In the span of a few minutes on Thursday afternoon, the Senate confirmed dozens of the president’s stalled nominees to key posts in several departments. The departments of Justice, Homeland Security, Veterans Affairs, and Commerce got...

July 17, 2017
In 2014, the Department of Veterans Affairs was mired in a scandal. An inspector general’s report had found “systemic” manipulation by government officials to hide lengthy and growing wait times at its medical centers. Veterans were waiting months for appointments, and dozens may have died because they could not get...